parasitegirl (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
parasitegirl) wrote2008-06-13 11:44 am
parasitegirl) wrote2008-06-13 11:44 am
Entry tags:
Can U Haz Agenda?
Ms. Ebisu has an agenda.
Names have been changed to protect Ms.Ebisu.
I arrived at city hall. The Milkman’s Sister looked concerned. She told me that she’d gotten a call from Ms.Ebisu, today’s teacher, and that we’d have to leave a little earlier than planned because Ms. Ebisu wanted to have a meeting…but that there was still time for me to enjoy my tea. I wasn’t sure why she looked so tense, a pre-class meeting isn’t unusual, but touchy subjects are often only revealed in the safety of Sister’s Pooh-bear filled car.
And they were.
M’s Sister said that Ms. Ebisu might be…difficult. Ms.Ebisu called this morning and when Sister asked Ebisu if she was ready to teach with me she was told, “Well, it’s not really up to me to decide yes or no, is it?”
Ooooh! Someone got a batch of cold pricklies and is seriously in need a warm fuzzy intervention.
Ms.Ebisu is early 40’s (I asked for an age to figure if I was dealing with older-Japan issues..) and lived abroad in Taiwan.…The school has complained a bit about Ms.Ebisu, but nothing specific. Our old friend and advisor, Mr. Super English Teacher, has been known to roll his eyes and gesture that he has no clue what can be done with Ms.Ebisu.
In the car Sister and I talked about what might be at issue. Ms.Ebisu might not feel confident in her English skills, she might have a lot of pride, and she might be better suited for the structure of Jr.High or High School. I opined that she always had the option NOT to teach. When you’re practically a volunteer and doing this work…you need to be getting joy from this work because goodness knows you’re not getting paid well. Sister asked me who told me about the pay for our support staff. I assured her no one had complained, but that she had sent me to photocopy contracts when we had the signing ceremony and that I can read! Fair enough.
To be English support staff you have to love it or have a goal it serves, because it’s not the money. It brings in a little extra income and is good for mothers who stay home some of the time. One teacher does it to have closer contact with the school district because her own daughter is still in the system (and is losing her hearing so will soon need assitance…) some do it to brush up their English game so they are better suited for a wider job scope down the line and one is recently retired but misses teaching.
We arrived at the school and sat down with Ms.Ebisu. She was well put together in a Japanese brand-mono way: tasteful accessories, make-up, and Coach bag…clearly the most affluent and style-aware teacher of our group…no sweatshirts with cartoon puppies for her. I was reminded of how my first meeting at my Elementary school years ago involved an explanation that I’d be wise to stop dressing so well for school, because elementary schools are dirty places with dirty kids. She either didn’t get the memo of this is her dressed down style.
Ms.Ebisu has poor communication skills.
I thought about the above sentence a bit after I wrote it. I had to ask myself if I was being sexist. I wondered if I would find her blunt and brusk approach palletable, even admirable in a man…or if I would find her approach ok in America but out of place in Japan. I decided that she’d be considered passive aggressive as an American woman and pigheaded if she were an American man. She’d make a fine power broker in some firm somewhere else, or an interesting politician/lobbyiest but that either as a male or as a female she’d be hard to work with in any primary or secondary education setting. Both would be labeled Not a Team Player and you wouldn’t want either as your boss. If she were in your university you’d hope she didn’t have enough tenure to mess with you…and if she did you’d hope she wasn’t in your department.
In the traditional of traditional Japan in an elementary school in a district trying to embrace a communication skills based English program…she’s in the wrong world.
She’s in the wrong place and her ability to judge a situation and adjust, or react to how people are reacting to her, is low. Her lack of adaptablity and flexibility didn’t matter last year. Last year the BOE didn’t have a goal or preferred method of teaching: the support staff was left to its own devices to make and implement whatever they wanted. This year there is a muddy goal, and impending switch to mandatory teaching in 2 years, and a preferred communication skill based method. We don’t teach English here. We create a foreign language environment filled with level/interest appropriate activities for students participate in order to stimulate critical thinking skills .
But, back to Ms.Ebisu.
It’s not often that I use my power voice, but as we talked I heard my voice growing lower and quieter. I speaking more slowly than normal and emphasizing my words in a way that wasn’t about language barriers, it’s the way that I talk when I am very upset with someone and want to make sure they understand every last word I am about to say. Some of you have heard this voice. It’s usually the voice that comes after the warning “angry shrill voice” but in some social situations I can’t deploy the shrill. The drop in volume of course is about getting people to lean in and listen. I use it in the classroom a lot. My power voice also featured the sort of monotone I use to say “I am not going into inject this conversation with any pitches you might find alarming. I think you are easily startled and perhaps crazy.”
I switched to English as well, which is a power thing.
She told me a lot about what she wanted me to do, but didn’t ask questions about the 2nd grade lesson plan we’d sent her (featuring “From Head to Toe”, and copious amounts of animal gesture games.) I outrank her, as does Sister.
“I want you to introduce yourself”
“That’s right here” (and I point to the quick “And this is Kathryn who will be teaching with us today.”)
“I want you to introduce yourself and talk about yourself. It is the student’s first time with a native speaker.”
“I will not give a long talk about who I am because the English that involves is above the 2nd grade level and I didn’t bring the visuals that help make that easy AND I do not want to re-enforce the idea that I am different from other teachers. I am not the focus of the class.”
“I want you to introduce yourself.”
“Yes. Ma’m”
“Why did you call me Ma’m?”
(long pause as I move on to the next topic…but eventually I do explain why I used Ma’m)
“I called you Ma’m because it sounded like you were giving me orders and that’s the natural way to respond to orders.”
Milkman’s Sister went into a variety of spiels about how our way of teaching does not require a native speaker and that we don’t want to re-enforce that idea with teachers who already think that THEY can’t teach English….that to teach English in this style requires confidence and very basic English skills, not fluency or Native Speakerdom. She listened and dismissed this. Whenever I said that Ms.Ebisu, or the homeroom teacher could very well do what I was asking I’d get the somewhat patronizing “but we are not Native speakers like you” which is a way of seeming to complement me but serves to dismiss my ideas and make it a me vs. the Japanese thing. Lady, the BOE has my back on this one.
I tried calmly explaining that the first time we taught she’d be best served being primarily an observer, that the lesson would make more sense to her after doing that and then we could discuss how best to integrate her. That part of why I go to schools is to give those schools a model lesson that illustrates our thinking about what elementary English education should be.
We headed to class after a very long exchange about pronunciation.
“I want you to teach correct pronunciation and accent.”
“That’s not what the lesson is about.”
“You are a native speaker, I want students to learn correct pronunciation and accent. I can speak English, but I am not a Native Speaker, this is good for them.”
“That is not the way our lessons work….I will re-enforce correct pronunciation but I will not teach pronunciation. I will not make students repeat after me. I will not correct pronunciation if it falls in the range that I understand. I will repeat the answer, but with the correct pronunciation, if a student mispronounces, “Yes, it’s an ELEPHANT” but I will not tell them that they did it wrong. I’ll model, but not correct at this stage.”
“Accent is very important.”
“There is a range of different accents and pronunciations within the world of English so…”
“No, there not. My linguistics professor is an American and he says…”
(Oh, fuck me, you did not bring your linguistics professor into this. This is NOT what we teach to 2nd graders…I had a fling with a crazy linguistics major/former TA/ crazy street performer. He gave me amphetamines when I caught the flu. The word linguistics isn’t going to make me retreat with respect, don’t get me started on the pain-in-the-ass views of certain linguistics majors…I know linguistics majors disagree and bicker like economists! Thank god it is time for class…)
She did keep quiet and supported well enough the first class. She held a book, didn’t get in my way, and didn’t correct anyone. I usually expect more of my support staff, but the first class is usually when they get a grasp of the style/lesson so I don’t expect THAT much.
The kids loved the lesson and the teachers enjoyed it and showed suitable impressed faces at the level their students interacted, used English, and responded to English without “how to “ prompting. I find that it’s best to ask a variety of questions to assess how much language they already have instead of “teaching” new vocab.
When I first started teaching elementary school, before Mr.Super English Teacher came into my life, I would teach songs like “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes.” Now I just hum it and point first…most of the students already know it from TV and they join in with the English. I reinforce the English words “yes, Head, shoulders…” for the few students who didn’t know it. I don’t act like it’s hard or something that they might not know. And then we’re on our way doing our acapella version of it. We go faster, faster, sloooooooow, and fast. If they are really good we do it backwards “Toes, knees, shoulders head, shoulders head…”
The class was hard to warm up at first. I know that look of fear and confusion they gave me. They had the look of classes that have had too much formal structure and certain behavior pushed on them in English classes. They had to unlearn waiting for artificial prompts, fears of being corrected, and the expectations Japanese explanations. When they relaxed it went well. These were 2nd graders…their natural state is not quiet and timid! Sometimes you’ll get a low energy/timid 5th or 6th grade class but never 2nd graders.
Over crap tea at recess (fuck you, Mr. Lipton) it was back to team Kathryn and Sister. We really are a bi-lingual and genki comedy team of sorts when it comes to our English Vision Presentations and Stories About the Effectiveness of Such a Vision. We had discussion on how we view the support staff in the class as a model of this our sort of teaching style and how they are our on-the-ground worker explaining this teaching style, and praising teachers who are overcoming English fears and getting involved in the classroom. We also discussed how to get her more involved with the next class.
She helped out more, but students found her English hard to understand because it was overly elaborate. She was shrill and loud when talking with us, but in class she does lack confidence and her voice becomes very small. Maybe it’s not lack of confidence, maybe it’s just an attempt to seem less scary to kids.
Then it was time for a final recap. It was a small school, only 2 homerooms per grade.
This is when I opted to hang back from the conversation a bit. The morning had been my time because it was time to address the specifics of my lesson, and the goals of the BOE were implied but somewhat secondary. Now the BOE was back in focus. We transitioned to Japanese and it became Sister and Ms. Ebisu time. Ebisu tried to get me more involved, but this was politically Sister’s time. I usually watch the person talking when I want to best understand something in Japanese, but this time I focused on watching Sister react to Ms. Ebisu’s words instead. It was more illuminating. It helped me understand that I wasn’t the only one working hard to remain pleasantly rigid. It also helped me control my facial expressions.
What’s Ms. Ebisu’s issue? She’s a phonics zealot.
She had a lot to say, and eventually Sister asked a string of “are you angry, is there a problem, are you upset about something?” questions and when Ms.Ebisu seemed surprised. She did a lot of the “Its not a problem, but I am sure many other teachers feel the way I do.” I am pretty sure they don’t. The other teachers send me fan mail, thank me profusely, worship/study with Mr. Super Language Teacher, and usually seem more energized and inspired after our lessons together.
I popped out with a quick “Your way of talking might be more forceful than you realize?” and pulled back again. I refraind from calling her Ma’m again
I have to say. Ms.Ebisu knew that I understood her Japanese. She seemed unaware of why Sister and I might find offense and hostility in her spiel of “Kathryn should only teach with the homeroom teachers here. I have learned a lot from this class but I have my own lesson plans. I study at (international university) and my grad school professors have looked at my lesson plans and tell me they are good. I don’t need Kathryn, it would be a waste of her time. I have people like Kathryn who can help me…” And it really didn’t get much better than that.
Oh, honey, if you think you have people like me, you’re wrong. People like me wouldn’t let this attitude go unchecked. People have regrets about losing people like me.
I know that one of our support staff is very much like me. She’s the one who cut her nails and removed her polish and eccentricities the day she met me for the first time, she’s also the one with the ballet daughter who may be going deaf. We’ve since had a heart to heart talk about the politics and personality altering you need to do to have the strong opinions that we do and survive the BOE/Traditional Japan workplace/expectations. We understand a certain amount of hiding and revealing feelings has to take place for the subversion desired. We talk about how my issues are different than hers (I am full-time and foreign) but where they overlap. I’d say we both understand what it’s like to have strongly held ideas about teaching that Ms.E has…which is why I find E a sad and annoying figure. To harness that drive and to expand her view would make her a valuable tool and teacher, but she simply doesn’t have the flexibility of mind or the awareness of perception. Or, maybe she does. Maybe this serves her goals and she doesn’t care about anything else.
In the car we compared notes to figure out if she came off as brash, offensive, and blockheaded in both languages…yup. I also explained what I could about phonics to Sister. Ms. Ebisu is not the only teacher with an interest in phonics, but she is the zealot. I’ve allowed for some brief flirting with phonics at the 5th and 6th grade level as long as it can be integrated in an interesting activity or is a brief 5 minute activity and the kids are staying interested…but not as a class focus and not in the lower grades. I don’t know shit about phonics but I am pretty sure the kids do not yet have the word base to make many of the mental connections needed to progress with reading/pronunciation stuff. If they aren’t hearing and understanding the words well enough I can’t expect them to make the next step of reading and pronouncation.
It’s a nimby thing. It should probably have a place in Jr.High, integrated into the lessons, but not in my back yard!
Ms.Ebisu, in my opinion, took this job to get teaching experience putting HER lesson plans into action. I think she views the class as her experiment room, her petri dish. She sees no need to try other teaching styles and is ignoring the reality that the board of education has goals for the English lessons that fall outside of a strictly phonics approach.
The sad thing is, her teaching style is weak. If she embraced our communication skills class it would be a challenge for her, but I think she’d get the communication skills and adaptability needed to teach a wide range of things to a variety of levels of students, including her precious phonics.
I bet she’s a horrible suck-up in her classes. A gunner.
The Milkman’s Sister and I think that we’re just going to have to bypass her until the next year’s contracts come up and we can get a different support staff member. She’s right, if she’s going to ignore our goals then it is a waste of my time to work with her again. It makes sense for me to make lesson plans that use the homeroom teachers so that I can personally get a handful familiar with our teaching style and ready to transition. We suspect that the teachers, if given the option after seeing a few classes, would also prefer letting her teach her phonics by herself and to team with me instead.
And that, is Ms. Ebisu.
The school count is thus:
I have taught at 13 out of 15 schools.
wow.
Re: wow.
(instead of my fine BFA in Drawing)
Re: wow.
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“There is a range of different accents and pronunciations within the world of English so…”
“No, there not. My linguistics professor is an American and he says…”
Hey, Ms Ebisu, come visit me and my family, and I'll talk as broad as I can so my alleged English accent traces aren't there to confuse you, and then you tell me there's no difference!
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But you know who doesn't care about those semantics? The world of ESL international Asian folks that our average Japanese speaker really needs a common language with...and me.
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“No, there not. My linguistics professor is an American and he says…”
The VAST majority of English speakers in the world are non-native. When is Asia going to get over this? It drives me effing crazy.
I love these answers with 1 person validation. I remember a student of Brown Eyes arguing heatedly with him that "All Canadians like ketchup."
Or his parttime job telling him how his last name was really pronunced "Are you Brown Ears?" "No, Brown Eyes." "Mr. Tanaka told me Ears." "No, it's Eyes." "I don't think so. It's Ears. Brown Ears." "It's MY NAME." "Yes, but I really think it's Ears." "Eyes." "Are you sure?"
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I love reading these posts because they are SO different from what I recall from school, and trust me that's a GOOD thing. I recall very stiff lessons, with the attitude that surely there is ONE! PERFECT! WAY! to say any given utterance in English (unlike Japanese of course which is marvelously flexible and therefore better) but that ONE! PERFECT! WAY! is so difficult to master that of course it's proper to be demure and far too shy to try saying anything. There was emphasis on pronunciation by people who had quite frankly horrible pronunciation (no native speakers anywhere in the system and these people were perhaps on the low end of the foreign TA range at big CS schools). All in all a strange brew of "English is cool but so hard and we have an inferiority complex about it, we don't want to make a mistake so we won't say anything" and "but I suppose we have to learn it because our own language is so special and difficult for anyone else to ever possibly learn ever" :P
Of course very often the ONE! PERFECT! WAY! sounds really strange and stilted to my modern American ears, even if it's grammatically correct.
And, I do notice in various Japanese learning communities there are students of the language who seem to get similar ideas about Japanese, that there must be ONE perfect way to say what they want to say, and they need that ONE answer...
Aside from that though it strikes me that your phrase "her ability to judge a situation and adjust, or react to how people are reacting to her, is low. " is a WONDERFULLY diplomatic way to render the slang "CKY" (超空気読めない）:)
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Oh, on the "one right way" thing...at least in my experience I think the way Japanese is taught really does this to people. I was constantly getting slapped for using the "wrong" words (e.g. shaberu vs. hanasu). I know my teachers were particularly old guard and this may have improved.
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I know, and my co-workers know, if I had gotten that ALT job in the nearby city, I would have gone crazy. I am so lucky to have this job where my superiors want my specific skill set/ideas/THIS way of teaching.
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P.S. My mom (
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